By Carrie Gann | YahooNews

The fact that Timothy Brown is a reasonably healthy 46-year-old is no small thing. Only a few years ago, he had AIDS.

"I feel good," Brown told ABC News. "I haven’t had any major illnesses, just occasional colds like normal people."

Brown is the only person in the world to be cured of AIDS, the result of a transplant of blood stem cells he received to treat leukemia.

"My case is the proof in concept that HIV can be cured," he said.

Brown got lucky. The blood stem cells he received came from a donor with a special genetic mutation that made him resistant to HIV. The genetic mutation occurs in less than 1 percent of Caucasians, and far less frequently in people of other races. Before Brown got his transplant in 2007, doctors tested nearly 70 donors for this genetic mutation before they found one who was a match.

But doctors hope that a similar solution could help other people with HIV: umbilical cord blood transplants.

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